Morpheus: a user-friendly modeling environment for multiscale

Morpheus: a user-friendly modeling environment
for multiscale multicellular systems biology
Walter de Back
Jörn Starruß
Lutz Brusch
Andreas Deutsch
Center for High Performance Computing, Technische Universität Dresden, 01062 Dresden, Germany
Contact: walter.deback@tu-dresden.de
Website: http://imc.zih.tu-dresden.de/wiki/morpheus
Introduction
Usability
Morpheus is a modeling environment for
the simulation and integration of cellbased models with ordinary differential
equations and reaction-diffusion systems
(Starruß et al., Bioinformatics, 2014).
✦ Modeling without programming
Morpheus separates modeling from programming by MorpheusML: a novel
domain-specific SBML-like mark-up language for multicellular systems biology.
It allows rapid model development of
multi-scale models in biological terms and
mathematical expressions rather than programming code.
Its graphical user interface supports the
entire workflow from model construction
and simulation to visualization, archiving
and batch processing.
✦ Automated model integration
It automates model integration linking
models of cellular, intra-cellular and
extra-cellular dynamics.
✦ Graphical work-flow tools
The graphical interface provides tools for
rapid model development, simulation,
batch processing and archiving.
Morpheusʼ graphical user interface
Graphical user interface
✦ Model editor
MorpheusML is a SBML-like language for
multicellular systems biology. The markup
language separates modeling from programming and enables users to describe
computational models in biological and
mathematical terminology rather than
programming code.
Rapid model development with add/
remove, copy/paste, disable/enable model
elements.
✦ Job scheduler
Scheduling of multithreaded and parallel
simulations, on both
local and remote computing resources.
Mathematical expressions (functions, differential equations and events) are specified in familiar infix notation.
✦ Simulation archive
Browsable archive of simulation models with
results, allows old models to be restored.
✦ High performance computing
Simulation, visualization and analysis
Support for high performance computing with
batch systems like LSF and SLURM. Syncing
results back to local computer via sftp.
✦ Batch processing
Parameter exploration
by creating sequences
of simulations with different parameter sets.
MorpheusML
Examples, documentation and downloads for
Linux, Mac OSX and Windows at:
http://imc.zih.tu-dresden.de/wiki/morpheus
MorpheusML enables model integration
by automatically resolving dependencies
between symbolic identifiers to determine
e.g. the order in which model components
must be updated.
Key references
J. Starruß, W. de Back, L. Brusch and A. Deutsch (2014). Morpheus: a
user-friendly modeling environment for multiscale and multicellular systems
biology. Bioinformatics, btt772.
✦
A. Köhn-Luque, W. de Back, et al. (2013) Dynamics of VEGF MatrixRetention in Vascular Network Patterning. Physical Biology, 10:066007.
✦
W. de Back, R. Zimm, L. Brusch (2013) Transdifferentiation of Pancreatic
Cells by Loss of Contact-mediated Signaling. BMC Systems Biology,
7:77.
✦
W. de Back, J. X. Zhou, L. Brusch (2012) On the Role of Lateral Stabilization during Early Patterning in the Pancreas. J. R. Soc. Interface
10(79):20120766.
✦
Model description in MorpheusML
Software
Modeling and simulation
✦ Differential equations
Systems of ordinary, stochastic
and delay differential equations
can represent temporal dynamics such as gene regulation,
metabolism or signaling and can
be imported from SBML models
available in repositories such as
the BioModels database.
✦ Reaction-diffusion
✦ Cell-based modeling
Cells can be represented as
point-like objects or with explicit
2D or 3D cell shapes, e.g. imported from TIFF microscopy
images. Interactions are specified between individual discrete
cells. Cell motility and biophysical constraints may be
added using the cellular Potts
Examples on website and GUI
model (CPM) framework.
Reaction-diffusion systems can
be used to model e.g. the spatial distribution of morphogens and binding/unbinding
to extracellular matrix components. The spatial domain may be imported from multistack images.
✦ Multiscale multicellular models
To study feedbacks between various levels
of biological organization, models can be
constructed that couple cellular dynamics
with intra- and/or extracellular dynamics.
Morpheus is a self-contained application
for Linux, Mac OSX and Windows that
consists of two stand-alone programs: a
C++-based simulator and a Qt-based
graphical user interface.
It uses muparser to evaluate math expressions, eigen for matrix operations,
openMP for parallel computing, libTIFF
for import/export of 3D images, SQLite for
archiving, and gnuplot as data visualization back-end.
Morpheus features a plug-in architecture
that allows extensions to be written in
C++. This transforms the current binary
application into a flexible framework following the planned open-source release.
The development of this software is supported by the
German Ministry for Education and Research (BMBF) as part of the Virtual Liver Network.